As a part of the planning for the Congreso Latinoamericano de Ética Teológica, convened at Pontificia Universidad Javeriana in Bogotá, Colombia this past May, coordinator MT Davila (Puerto Rico), stressed the importance of including US Latina/o theological ethicists as participants in the conversation. Congreso organizers included US Latina/o ethicists from a range of ethnic backgrounds (Cuban, Puerto Rican, Mexican) and regional contexts within the US in an effort to enrich this first Congreso with a breadth of US Latina/o perspectives. I was humbled to be among those asked to participate and to present to our Latin American colleagues my work on human trafficking and aesthetic solidarity. I was troubled, however, by what my participation in the Congreso revealed about the state of theological ethics in the United States: that our discourse, even as it claims “global” engagement, remains largely disconnected from Latin America and other “global south” contexts. Our claims to global engagement rest on developing efforts that would cultivate sustained and meaningful interaction manifest in our local ethical conversations.

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